Laser plasma production of metal-corannulene ion-molecule complexes

Gas-phase metal-corannulene ion-molecule complexes are produced by covaporization of materials in a laser plasma source and detected using a time-of-flight mass spectrometer. This is achieved by mixing metal, metal oxide, or organometallic powders with corannulene powder and covaporizing the mixture with 532 nm laser light. The mass spectra obtained reveal that transition metals and rare earths efficiently produce mono- and di-ligand complexes of the form M+(cora)(n), with n = 1, 2. Metal oxides are found to produce the mono-ligand complex with high efficiency. Covaporization of the organometallic pi-complex iron cyclopentadienyl benzene with corannulene yielded both homoligand and heteroligand corannulene complexes. The binding energy of the iron cation to corannulene is suggested to be greater than its binding energy to benzene but less than its binding energy to cyclopentadiene.